Down the Rabbit Hole
by lost0and0found
Summary: COMPLETE... I think. "The rabbit-hole went straight on like a tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down a very deep well." Set post 6x16. Two-shot. RJ.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, I make no profit out of them.

A/N: The quote in the resume is not mine, it's Carroll's.

I've been reading some RJ stories lately and this is strongly inspired by them; you can check my list of favourites and you'll figure it out yourselves... Enough _dis_claiming, now _claiming_...

**Set after 6 x 16** /practically about **a month before Jess' book signing**, set right after Rory learned how Logan spent his time during their breakup/. A one-parter, just something that bugged me...

I hope you enjoy:) Reviews are always welcome, they make my monologue sort of a dialogue...

* * *

Jess opens the door slowly, more for his own comfort, than for anything else. He really doesn't know what to expect. When Lorelai showed up at Truncheon a week ago and delivered him with the news, he had thought he must be hallucinating.

_'Jess, I know her. Believe me, if anyone can tell when she's going bad, it's me. And she is, Jess. This has been bad enough as it is and it's only getting worse...' _

_Lorelai goes on and on and Jess thinks his head is about to explode. _

_'I know you and I were never quite the buddies,' she continues apologetically, __pleadingly,_ 'but I also know that you care about her. Boy, who thought I would be saying this but, maybe, of all people, you're the only one who cares about Rory almost as much as I do.' 

_She shakes her head when he opens his mouth to protest. _

_'Don't say that you don't cause you'd be lying, and I've really had enough of denial through the last month... The thing is, you were the only one who managed to put some reason in her head two months ago and make her go back to Yale, and she confronted her grandma, and, believe me, it's none less of a challenge than entering 'Fear', but she did it, and she won't listen to me and...' Lorelai's hands hang helplessly in the air and then she drops them back in her lap, defeated. 'I don't think I can do this alone,' she shakes her head and a tear rolls down her cheek. When she looks up at him, her eyes are bluer and for a second he thinks he saw Rory cry._

Jess enters the room reluctantly, knocking quietly on the wooden door frame.

'Hey,' he greets awkwardly and steps from one foot to the other.

She is lying in her bed, reading some sort of beauty magazine. It's almost like she's been sleeping and now she's having her morning cup of coffee before she stands up and gets dressed for work. Only the folded wheelchair, propped right to the bed, under her window, somehow doesn't fit. It's the only thing he doesn't think he'll get used to seeing in her room.

A pause of neither of them talking. She doesn't even look up at him. But it's her turn to speak. She recognized the voice, he's sure. He stands like this, hands hidden behind his back, holding the book he has brought for her, and excuse to make contact, something to get through a meaning without the words needed.

'Go away, Jess,' she says at last. Her voice is even and she pronounces the words firmly... _calmly_. She has said those words so many times since that unfortunate night, she's mastered the sentence, only putting a different name at the end. She has made her decision. They are supposed to mind it. End of story.

_'She stopped physiotherapy, Jess. She's giving up and I can't seem to find a way to stop it...'_

Dull lines pass through his mind. Like joking about her not being happy to see him, she didn't even stand up to meet her guest, and there he thought Rory would never lose her manners. Or about criticizing the crap she was reading, he had always thought women bought that kind of stuff cause the paper they used for printing it was good for window cleaning.

He observes her face. Like a sculpture, she keeps pretending to be caught up in the glossy pages. Something about nail polish tendencies this fall. Capturing thoughts on what this season's shoe fashion choices have to surprise us with. Porcelain-like, her skin is smooth and milky, saved for the fresh pink scar above her left eyebrow. That must be where her head hit the passenger window. Jess swallows.

'A swan beaked me,' he blurts out at last.

Rory looks up from the magazine and her eyebrows slightly rise.

'That night at your grandparents' place,' he continues with a shrug, making a small step towards the bed. 'The black eye wasn't from a football game, I was just hanging around the pond and the stupid thing came outta nowhere and BAM! It_ attacked_ me, beaked me right in the eye and almost blinded me,' he babbled, trying to catch her reaction, if any. She blinked humorlessly, maybe wondering if he had just lost his mind. 'Luke didn't believe me, of course,' Jess continues, shaking his head, 'but I needed revenge, so I took his new ladle and we went to the pond, waiting for the vicious thing to appear, lurking in the shadows with Luke's old boat, you know...'

Jess trails off, wondering if it was a smile nipping at the corners of her mouth he just noticed. He swallows again.

'Here,' he says, stepping closer and leaving the book in her lap, 'I brought you something.'

She looks up at him and he sees a silent question float in her cold blue eyes.

_When are you leaving? _

Her eyes are asking._  
_

_I'm not._

He shrugs, an insecure smile hidden at the corners of his mouth.

_How come? _

She frowns.

_Why would I be leaving? For the first time in your life you actually fucking need me, why on Earth would I be leaving?_

He sighs.___  
_

* * *

'I want him gone,' Rory says impassively as she watches Jess smoke a cigarette on the porch and absentmindedly play with Paul Anka. Her wheel chair is next to the living room french window and she's turned her back towards the rest of the room.

Lorelai's chin quivers slightly before she replies.

'He's staying,' she concludes firmly.

Rory's eyes avert from Jess and dart towards her mother's, her expression a mixture of anger and pain.

'I don't want him here,' she says coldly, almost between her teeth.

Lorelai sighs and gives her daughter a long look before she continues unpacking the groceries Jess brought a couple of minutes earlier.

Rory's breathing quickens and her lips are pursed in a thin white line as she watches her mother methodically arrange eggs on the fridge door. She can't reach them from the chair. One Wednesday afternoon, while Lorelai was still at the inn, Rory had spent half an hour reaching up and yet she didn't manage to reach the damn eggs on the fridge door.

'Mom, I don't need him here!' Rory raises her voice, and it comes out like a cry for help, pleading, desperate. She can't have him watch her like this, whatever memories they have of each other, she wants to keep them the way they are.

'I do,' Lorelai answers quietly, her voice trembling, and for a moment Rory thinks she sees her reflection crying.

* * *

Jess enters the house, using the spare key Lorelai gave him, and it's strangely quiet. The lamps are on, but without the constant babble of the TV or Lorelai's rambling about Luke being a stubborn mule for not letting her design new menus while unpacking take over food in a way so noisy Jess never thought possible even if she were actually cooking the food.

Jess throws the keys on the coffee table and goes to the kitchen where he leaves Luke's package on the bar plot. Paul Anka pads into the kitchen, following Jess and the smell of freshly cooked food.

'Hey, Muttley,' Jess says as he taps the dog's head absentmindedly, looking around, 'Where is she, huh?'

The noise comes out sharp and sudden and for a moment Jess is frozen, not sure what he has just heard and where it came from. Broken glass, a woman's cry and something stumbling, rolling over the floor. Tiles? He thinks the sound was like something dropped over tiles.

'Rory?' he cries out, rushing up the stairs.

As he reaches the bathroom door, he doesn't knock, he opens and stops in his track as he sees her, trying to catch his breath.

'Get out, Jess,' Rory whispers faintly, her hands moving shakily to cover her naked form in a self-conscious gesture. She is sitting on the floor, the bath tap running behind her, her feet sprawled in an unnatural position, shampoos, shower gels and toothpaste scattered on the tiles around her. The wheel chair lies, tumbled over, close to her left foot. One of the glass shelves beside the sink is broken, the edges sticking out sharp, the broken pieces lying in the sink and over the floor. There is a bright red line over Rory's right forearm, dripping with blood, the drops trailing down her elbow and then making red-stained puddles over her thigh.

'You're bleeding,' Jess says calmly as he moves carefully to take hold of her arm.

Rory looks up at him terrified.

'Get out!' she cries out and shudders, surprised by the desperation of her own voice.

Jess' arm stops midway towards hers and he gives her a long look and then his jaw is clenching, but he doesn't say anything back. Instead, he backs off slowly and stands up. Then he starts to unbutton his shirt and Rory's mouth drops open.

Rory watches him with her eyes wide, too shocked to utter a word.

Jess continues to undress, taking the shirt off and then peeling the tee he is wearing under it, putting them on the floor. Shoes and socks follow before he unbuckles the belt of his jeans and strips down to his boxers, leaving the jeans on top of the pile he has just made, his eyes holding her gaze. He quickly decides against taking the boxers off, considering their lack a bigger awkwardness factor than their presence.

He bends down slowly, careful not to scare her, as if trying to capture a wounded animal, and then kneels next to her, wiping a piece of glass behind, his eyes not leaving hers. He reaches over and stops the bath tub, trying the water with his fingers before he lifts it up to her cheek to move a wet strand away. Rory winces slightly at his touch, but doesn't move back. He tilts his head to catch her eyes and gives her a short nod, a silent warning before he puts his arms around her carefully and scoops her up, minding her legs as he steps into the bath and slowly lands them both into the hot water. She watches him like a little girl as he reaches back for a shower gel and squeezes some into his palm before he spreads it down her shoulders, her arms, rubbing gently, comfortingly. When he reaches her breasts he checks the look in her eyes and gives her a short nod, moving directly to her back and then her belly. She quivers as he reaches a spot around her navel and he remembers she is ticklish. Her legs follow and there is a distinct bitterness in her eyes as he takes her right leg in his arms and inspects it.

He wonders if she sees the awe in his eyes, as he looks at her naked body, as he traces her perfectly shaped long legs. She wonders if he sees how pathetic her lifeless limbs are, how half of her body can't feel and how she fears soon she won't ever be able to feel anything at all.

As Jess puts some shampoo in his hand and lifts it towards her hair, some thought occurs to him and he takes one of her hands in his, putting half of the shampoo in her palm. Rory's brows furrow and for a moment he's afraid he has broken the spell, but the next moment her hand moves up and, timidly, she is rubbing shampoo over his hair. His fingers tangled in her hair, he lifts his free hand to touch her cheek. She mirrors his moves and he leans into her touch, keeping the eye-lock, tilting his head so that he kisses her palm, just below the wrist.

His hands find her wrists and take hold of them, placing her arms over his shoulders and slowly lifting her up, holding her torso between his palms. As he lifts them up to a standing position, her toes are barely touching the bathtub bottom.

He closes his right hand around her waist so that he can turn the shower on with his left. Water starts running down their faces, washing white foam away.

Rory takes a shallow breath and looks down to her legs, which are hanging stiffly from her waist, barely touching the floor, and when she looks back up at Jess, her eyes are watery. Roll. Roll. Roll-roll-roll. Tears start rolling down her cheeks, mixing with water, and her features contort in a painful grimace. Her hands close tighter around his neck, bringing him closer, and next thing she knows, he is kissing her face everywhere her tears fell, retracing their tracks gently.

She tastes like salt and shampoo and like pain. Like weeks of suppressed outbursts. His arms close tight around her as she shakes with a sob. Then another one.

At first the sobs are silent, suffocating her more and more. And then she hears her own voice, as if it belongs to someone else, and this other woman (girl?) is crying out loud, and sounds like she's broken, and tries to say Jess' name but can't form a single coherent word.

* * *

He dries her with the towel, wrapping it around her shoulders, rubbing gently. She's sitting in her bed, the way he put her down against the headboard, and she's staring at him numbly. Her eyes are dry now. Red but dry.

I'll be right back, he says, and walks out. When he comes back, he's changed into a dry pair of sweatpants and a tee and he's bringing her a pair of underwear and a nightgown.

He dresses her like a doll and tucks her in and then stands up from the bed to turn the light off and leave.

'Jess?' she whispers, her voice scratchy and unsure.

'Huh?' he answers, turning to face her.

'Can you stay?' she asks quietly.

He gives her a look and then nods.

'Sure,' he says and turns the night lamp off, moving to drag a chair next to her bed when her hand finds his and pulls him lightly. A silent question she doesn't voice but gets through, moving to one side of the bed and then letting his hand free so that he could make his decision.

Jess stays still for a moment before he lies next to her, putting an arm under his head and turning his head to the left to face her.

'Night, Rory.'

'Night, Jess,' she echoes and for the first time since the accident she thinks she feels something.

* * *

'I tell you that you kicked me,' he repeats stubbornly and her eyes sting with hurt and anger.

'Not funny, Jess,' she says warningly, as she rests another folded tee in her lap.

'Crap, Rory, I'm not joking, you were sleeping and your leg twitched, goddamn it!' Jess growls in frustration, standing up from the couch, pacing through the living room.

She shakes her head. Wishful thinking. That's what this is. She once thought herself that her toe had moved, but then, when she tried, it was dead.

_Dead, Jess! That's what it is! Dead! And you can't undo what's done, will you and everyone around wrap your head around that? Damn, you're like everyone else, you want me to be perfect... Well, here comes a surprise, I'm **not**! All I am is a cripple. A cripple, Jess! Don't like the way it sounds? So sorry. Cripple, cripple, cripple!_

'It's a trick of the mind,' she sighs, her fervor suddenly down.

'If not?' he challenges and stops before her, bending to meet her eyes, his brows curled up. He looks like a big question mark, always was. Questioning her decisions, criticizing her assumptions. A big question mark.

'Damn it, Jess! For once, why don't you accept facts as they are!' she steams up again and tosses the folded tees from her lap to the coffee table.

'And what are the facts, exactly?' he asks pointedly.

'You know what they are,' she replies and her tone is soaked with accusation.

Why, _why_ is he putting her through this? Is it some twisted kind of revenge?

She shifts to draw her wheelchair back and turns it to the right so that she can avert from his gaze.

'Seems I need to be reminded, though,' he notes in a sore tone, crossing his hands before his chest.

She takes another washed tee from the pile and starts folding it but then she stops and rumples it in a ball and hits it against the wheelchair armrest.

'I won't walk, I won't feel, I won't ever stand up to reach the damn eggs on the fridge door!' she raises her voice, losing her cool.

'You're in pain, you're ashamed and you quit physiotherapy!' he shouts back. 'And you're angry, you're so damn angry, you wanna push everyone away.'

She looks up at him and her eyes glitter.

'You know what? I am. I _am_ angry. I am _outraged,_' she takes a breath and continues, 'I'm angry cause my boyfriend cheated on me and didn't even have the guts to tell me in person, I'm angry cause he had too much to drink and we had a huge fight in his Porsche after his sister's wedding, I'm angry cause he tried to talk me into staying in the car and I took my belt off and wanted to get out, I'm angry cause he lost control and we crashed and the car flipped over, I'm angry cause he didn't even have the dignity to come and confront me after the accident, he only sent those stupid flowers and presents and things... _Things, things, things!_' she fumes, and her eyes are blazing.

'And I'm angry, oh, I'm so angry with myself for not being able to prevent all of these earlier! Cause I could! I shouldn't have gotten into that car, I shouldn't have tried to get out, I shouldn't have stayed in a relationship with a man who doesn't have the guts to be kept responsible for his mistakes. Even _you_ could see how much I had wronged myself, you could figure it out in a couple of minutes, yet I needed to lose one year and half of my body to realize how much I had screwed,' she shakes her head, trying to catch her breath. 'And I don't hate anyone but _myself_, I can't _stand_ me anymore, Jess,' she takes a breath and chokes on it and hides her face in her hands so that she doesn't have to face his reaction.

'I know,' he whispers, kneels in front of her and puts his arms on both her sides, squeezing her shoulders lightly.

'You don't,' Rory sobs and Jess chuckles humorlessly.

'Oh, believe me, I do,' he assures, 'what do you think I felt for myself when I left Stars Hollow?' he asks rhetorically.

'Or when, completely out of the blue, I told you how I felt about you and didn't even have the balls to stick around long enough to get a proper answer? Or when I asked you to ride with me into the sunset, leaving it all behind? I _despised_ myself, Rory, I wanted to be that guy that made you happy, but all I did was mess it up, and I hated myself for being a fucking coward and for turning out to be like my father. You know the irony? All my life I tried not to become Jimmy, but in the end, all I did was retrace his steps,' he shakes his head.

'There was that image I feared,' he continues, 'the one I pictured if you decided to leave with me and we actually ran away together. I pictured us living in that shitty scum apartment, you getting pregnant and me leaving you cause I'm a fucking bastard. I pictured leaving without even saying _goodbye_, leaving you a goddamn _note_, a post-it, a whatever, reading_ 'I'm sorry, I can't' _or some shit like that. And I imagined this picture every time I thought we could run away together and be happy, and that was why I felt so damn _relieved_ when you said no to me when I asked you to run away,' he pauses to catch his breath and her eyes are wide and fixed on his as he meets her gaze.

'Believe me, I know what it feels like to be angry with yourself,' he says in a calmer tone, trying to compose himself. 'The thing is, it doesn't get you anywhere,' he adds bitterly.

Rory blinks a couple of times and they stay still, staring at each other for a while.

'What changed?' she asks quietly.

'What do you mean?' he furrows.

'You're not angry anymore, what changed?' she repeats and a small smile starts floating over his lips.

'I found myself other things to look up to,' he shrugs. 'I found myself things to look at whenever I thought I was becoming Jimmy and those things keep my focus, cause I know that at least I _tried_.'

Another beat of silence passes before Rory speaks again.

'I'll think about it,' she says at last, avoiding his eyes. She licks a lip before she adds, 'But if, _if_ I'm getting a therapist, if it's a man he's gonna be young and sexy, and if it's woman she's gonna be old and disgusting,' she points out and he chuckles.

Right now, he really wants to kiss her. But he knows well it's not the time. She's in that fragile state between despising and forgiving herself and she will misread any sign of affection as one of pity. He looks at her and her lips a thin white line, her knuckles white, clutching at the rumpled tee and he takes a mental picture of her at that very moment. That's what her inner struggle looks like and he makes a mental note to keep this kiss for a time when it will feel right.

Some time passes, but the silence is comfortable.

'You would've come back,' she says then and he frowns.

'Huh?'

'Maybe you'd freak out and leave, but you would've come back,' she repeats. 'You always do.'

* * *

She watches him as he packs up and her eyes skip between him and the clock on the shelf. In ten minutes he'll be gone. That's soon. It's always too soon. She wishes he had already left, so that this painful state would not prolong for... her eyes check again... nine more minutes.

'I'll be keeping an eye on the door for you,' he says two minutes later, the travel bag in his right hand.

She looks at him and takes a picture in her mind. She wants to remember this so that she doesn't start to pine once he's gone. Cause there's this thing about him, he always leaves. And she's not going to pine. She hopes he didn't think she was going to pine.

'I told you I'm not coming,' she says coldly, as if she's trying to pin him with the words, leave a mark, get it over with.

'I want you to,' he says quietly and she turns the wheelchair around so that he doesn't see her eyes. They betray her, cause they already miss him. And they pine. Just a little, but they do.

'Bye, Jess,' she says determinedly and her eyes fix on the clock on the shelf.

* * *

Lorelai waits on the porch, a package in her hands. Luke's waiting in his pick up in front of the house.

'Hey,' Jess greets as he puts the travel bag down.

'Hey,' Lorelai greets back. 'That's... that's for you,' she sighs a little nervously and gives him the package.

'You haven't cooked it... right?' Jess asks, concern tracing his voice.

'Boy, _no_!' Lorelai shakes her head vigorously. He must really think she hates him. 'No, it's Luke's plus some junk energy bars I managed to sneak into the package while he was not looking,' she explains conspiratorially.

'Oh. Okay. So,' He digs the keys out of his pocket and gives them to her.

She takes them awkwardly, not sure how to say what she wants to say.

'Good luck on book signing,' she smiles, 'Luke's coming,' she adds and Jess smirks.

'Yeah,' he affirms. 'The look on his face will be precious when he meets some of Matt's poets.'

Lorelai smiles politely, not sure if he's joking.

'Thanks,' she says at last, 'For... for everything,' she adds awkwardly, making an indefinite gesture with her hand.

'I think most of the time I yelled at her,' he shrugs, '... so you're welcome... I guess.'

He bends and takes the bag and starts to leave.

'Jess...'

He turns back.

'I think yelling works just fine.'

He nods and for a moment he thinks he sees Rory smiling.

* * *

He sends his last guests, shakes hands and at last it's over. Too many people praising him and tapping his shoulder makes him sick, although he can't deny there's a certain thrill that he feels when he gets some feedback for his work. However, the real feedback he will receive in a couple of months, when the initial fuss is over. Until then...

He leans back against the wooden front door of the building and fishes his pocket for a cigarette.

As he takes a long first drag and lets it out slowly, he looks around. The street is almost empty, and that's how he likes it best. And then he feels rather than sees someone shifting position a few feet away. She's sitting in the wheelchair, her purse in her lap and he thinks her hands are trembling. He can't see her eyes, only her profile, cause she's facing the occasionally passing cars.

'Well, isn't this a day of surprises?' he approaches her and mirrors her position, facing the passing-by cars.

Minutes pass and he has stubbed his cigarette long ago before any of them speaks. When she does, her voice is quiet and maybe a little mean, and she keeps her gaze straight ahead.

'I stood there and held that fancy needle kit Emily had given me for my eighteenth birthday,' she says and there's a certain cruel vibe in her voice. 'Mom was out...' she pauses and he frowns, looking down at her, but she keeps staring ahead.

The pause stretches for a while and she wishes he waits until she finds her words doesn't end it. He doesn't.

'I was gonna do something stupid,' she says at last. 'But then, your voice was all I heard and I...' she sighs, lost for words.

The first time she goes after him, she's in a wheelchair. She shakes her head, not wanting to think over the irony in that.

'I don't think I can do this without you,' she finishes, and it feels both like she's relieved and terrified by that fact.

He doesn't say anything in reply and the longest couple of minutes stretch between them. When she gathers the courage to look up at him, he's smiling.

'I would've come back, you know,' he shrugs and takes her hand in his. It's cold and shaky and he squeezes her fingers between his, conducting warmth and comfort she didn't think she remembered how to feel. 'I always do, right?'

She feels something pass through her. It's more of a trick of the mind than an actual perceptible feeling, but it's there. She doesn't know what to expect, they've never been this way before, she never imagined they would ever have to, and she doesn't know what to expect. But, somehow, that's okay.

* * *

**Reviews would let me know what you think...**


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Quote in the resume - not mine; quotes in italic, surrounded by "~"-s - not mine, either; characters - not mine. As you can see, I own nothing, except for, sometimes, my free will...

A/N: _Here - I've changed the status of this story, marking curiosity's victory march over my humble self. I'm just curious where this may lead, and I'm about to explore it, in a second chapter, as it seems... not sure if there's gonna be another one, this was so planned to be a one-shot... Anyway, the courage to update this has been strongly assisted by those of you who reviewed:) Special thanks to everyone who demanded this sequel... Hope you enjoy!_

* * *

_~"It's a terrible love that I'm walking with spiders..."~_

Rory shifts into a more comfortable position and his fingers follow her movement, absentmindedly raking through her hair.

She's lying on the sofa, her head resting against his torso, using him as a pillow, her legs propped against the armrest. She's watching the movie and he's been playing with her hair ever since the opening credits, looping strands round his thumb and slightly pressing them between his fingers before letting them fall back to her shoulder.

As she shifts, her ear presses against his ribs and she listens to the steady rhythm of life's march through his body. She's grown used to the sound, the way even kids are born with the knowledge that this is what life sounds like. And to her, life sounds just like that - quiet evenings in the living room, watching a movie, reading, talking. Discussing literature or music, movies or politics, debating over conceptual art or Stars Hollow's most recent festival.

They have fallen into an easy routine and last Monday she realized he had _his_ coffee mug in her mother's cupboard and _his_ shelf in the bathroom.

'Turns out he's a killer of children,' Rory says and Jess almost chokes on his beer, his right hand freezing with the bottle just above her head.

He hasn't been paying much attention to the movie ever since the opening credits. He's been concentrated on her regular breathing, instead. The way it settles when she rests her head against his ribs. He needs to make contact, just hold on to something that's her, without any of them feeling awkward or uncomfortable, so he likes the way her hair feels between his fingers.

'I like that,' she continues and he realizes she's referring to a quote from the movie they've been watching (well, okay, _she_'s been watching), what was it, again? Oh. Right. _'Me and You and Everyone We Know'_. Some weird film Lorelai made Rory check on, cause _'Luke didn't get a clue, it's an absolute must see, grasshopper.'_

'It summarizes disappointment so well,' she concludes pensively and Jess wonders what she's been thinking about. Tonight she's quieter and he can't come up with a certain reason why.

Rory listens to his heartbeat. She closes her eyes to the soft thump and she's sitting on the porch again, wrapped in a shawl, reading, and he's making notes in the margins of a new manuscript he received mere hours ago, a pencil stuck behind his ear. Sometimes he reaches for his smoke in the ashtray on the coffee table before him and tries to scribble something with it, and another time he tries to smoke his pencil and her laughter rolls down her lips from the rocking chair she made Lorelai sneak for her from the Inn. The raindrops play hide and seek with autumn leaves in this windless afternoon just a few feet from them, and the air smells like rain and oncoming winter and like his unfinished smoke in the ashtray. Rory opens her eyes and concentrates back on the movie.

As the final credits start floating up the screen, neither of them shifts and they remain still, enjoying each other's company in silence neither of them wants to break. It's more of a mutual understanding, than it's pretending to be asleep. It's keeping contact without the need to search for an excuse. Just... being.

The screen has automatically turned off for more than ten minutes now and Jess shifts slightly as Rory stifles a yawn.

As he stands up and scoops her up, she breathes in and keeps him in her lungs for as long as possible. There is his cologne and cigarettes and coffee and the overall trail of beer.

She closes her eyes as he carries her up the stairs and imagines what he tastes like, right now. She can almost feel the astringent aftertaste from his beer as he leans into her so he can put her on the bed.

It sends chills down her spine when their cheeks touch briefly and his stubble grazes against her skin. It ignites a spark she knows is a slow fire burning, creeping up her cheeks, turning her stomach inside out every time she passes by his room /_his_ room? the guest room... _the guest room, right_/ and sees him type on his laptop bare-chested, his fingertips flying over the keys, his black rimmed glasses /she laughed for at least half an hour when she saw him, _Mariano wearing nerdy glasses, so uncool_, she would tease/ slightly tilted to the side, his hair messy, the tip of his tongue barely touching his lower lip...

Sometimes she tries to remember what kissing him tasted like, four years ago. She can't name it, though, it's just a feeling of him she's kept through the years, no particular smell or taste or sound to remember him by, only the memory of losing yourself to somebody, a hint of tobacco and excitement, and sometimes she thinks she wants to lose herself again...

Then, the worm of reality emerges, gnawing at her senses, biting at her lips, reminding her that all of this, whatever _it_ is they have, is stolen time, almost unreal, sneaked in between the events of real life. And if she is trying to take a firmer grip of him, crossing the border of friendship every now and then by these little gestures of physical closeness, it's only because she knows that every passing minute moves her closer to the time when she'll have to let him go. This honeymoon-like utopia they've been floating in can't go on forever. Better keep it vague and simple. Better keep a distance. _Cause, how many times will you be able to catch up with him on these wheels?_ She lets a breath out and turns her back to him as soon as she feels her head press against the mattress of her bed.

* * *

Jess rubs the back of his neck and leaves his smoke rest in the ashtray, replacing it with a cup of no longer hot coffee. He's staying on the porch; Paul Anka is lying under the small coffee table, keeping him quiet company.

Dark grey clouds float closer, carrying oncoming rain and he wonders if it's gonna be raining the whole day.

His reading glasses are perched on his nose and a gust of wind lifts up the ancient knit dark green pullover Lorelai blackmail-forced him to put over his shoulders in return for coffee. He sniffs, suppressing a sneeze, the damp air passing through his body bristly.

Last night she was gonna kiss him. He was sure. No evident reason. He just knew. There was this short moment of compressed time when the room stood still, concentrating, and the silence held a breath, the air thick with anticipation, blood speeding up, shivers down the spine, but then she turned away.

All that time during the past couple of weeks they were lingering between friendship and something more, all that time they were a bare inch from giving this unvoiced intimacy some substance, a kiss from defining it as something real, beyond stolen glances and that feeble feeling of belonging that could break in a single touch.

'Snowing already?' Lorelai asks when he walks into the kitchen, leaving his empty cup on the counter.

'Raining.' Jess answers as he takes his glasses off and starts wiping them in his shirt, his eyes searching for Rory around the living room. 'Just started,' he adds absentmindedly as he sees her sitting in the wheelchair next to the french windows, reading.

She managed to maintain a standing position this morning, though most of her weight was placed on the walking aids and the physiotherapist supported her all along. She collapsed on the ground the next moment, when she tried to move. When he and Lorelai ran to help her climb back up, she hissed them to keep the hell away.

He makes a few reluctant steps in her direction and stops to have a look. Her body has changed through the past weeks. Her legs are even thinner than before, but her upper body has grown more wiry and not so slender, her shoulders clearly shaped under the elastic of her blouse.

He has his own Braille when he is reading her body. Her shoulders are sharp and stiff as she's reading the book, her elbows are resting sharp against the wheelchair and he can tell she's in a sore mood. As he turns back to leave the room, he meets Lorelai's gaze. She doesn't say anything, just keeps wiping the plates in the kitchen and her features don't register judgement when her eyes follow him as he goes up the stairs.

* * *

Rory stops the wheelchair in the corridor, right before his door. The _guest room_ door. Whatever.

She takes a breath. There are two ways that this may go. It can go like this: she cows and turns the chair around, and she goes back to her room and finishes that chapter of _'Rooftops of Tehran'_ where she had left off. Or it can go like that: she confronts him and seeks a resolution.

She needs to know if there is, if even the faintest, chance, so that she has time to prepare her heart to be milled. Cause _there is no_ chance, an inner voice reminds her. But she needs to find out for herself, have something actually existing to point and say _'Look, that's why we won't work out'._

Her hands are sweaty over the wheels as she bends and engages the hill-holder. Then she wipes her palms in her jeans. She can barely feel the touch over her thighs. It's been over a month since she renewed physiotherapy and all she can think of is that she's condemned to two ghosts of legs. Barely feels, barely moves. Barely lives. But she knows that, if, _if_ she can move up to stand, if even for a short goddamn second she can have her feet back, she'll have hope, she'll know there is a _chance_.

She closes her eyes and tries to imagine what it will feel like to slowly and unsteadily rise up and reach a standing position, then lean against the door frame and knock on his door. She thinks what his eyes would look like if he sees her standing, but then shakes her head. The image is just too painful to imagine now, while sitting in the chair, gripping at the wheels.

If she can do this now, she promises herself to ask him for a chance, she promises herself to _fight_ for one.

She takes a breath and pushes herself up off the chair.

* * *

Jess jumps with the sound of someone stumbling right at his door and pushes his chair back from the desk immediately. As he opens the door, he sees her lying on the floor, her face hidden behind a curtain of hair as she pushes her upper body to a sitting position, using her trembling hands for support.

He suppresses the urge to lift her. He knows better. If he does, she'll send him away, and he's tired of this on and off dynamic she has established. She's pulling him closer just to push him away the next moment, and he can't handle this in and out thing, it's happening much too fast for him to adapt. And he knows that, right now, she has all these insecurity issues, nothing is the same after the accident, but she has to make up her mind. He cannot be switched on and off, he's not a lamp. Even if he could, he wouldn't let anyone push his buttons for much too long. Even her.

She must have tried to stand up. Jeez, what was she thinking? It's been just a month since she started physiotherapy, what was she trying to prove?

He lets out a sigh and sits down, leaning his back against the door frame. If he was at his apartment back at Truncheon, he would've lit a cigarette. He's not, so he just sits idly, staring ahead.

"Do you take pride in your hurt?" he quotes and she stiffens, pressing her palms harder against the corridor carpet. _Maybe you're playing a part on a great stage with only yourself as audience, _she finishes the quote inwardly and her heart cringes.

'Sometimes I feel grateful for the accident,' he says so quietly she thinks she might have imagined it. But then he continues. 'Like, for once, I know why I'm the mess you chose, cause...' he breaths out through his nose, refusing to look at her, '... cause you're in a worse place right now.'

Her breath hitches in her throat and her eyes squeeze shut.

'You're doing this the wrong way,' he continues in cold logic, and she's suffocating. 'You're looking for an excuse to quit and that's not the way to do this.'

Rory's chin is quivering, but she doesn't feel the tears coming. They are there somewhere, but they're not in drops, they have formed a mist and she's sailing inside it, inside a hundred mists, and she wants to scream, she's been keeping this cry in her throat for so long, and now she realizes it will come out the moment she stops hearing his voice. His voice is the only thing she can cling to, but it's tearing her apart in his merciless analysis.

'You're picking unrealistic aims,' Jess continues in the same distant, coldblooded voice, dissecting her, 'and base your hope on their achievement. You're trying to prove there is no chance, making sure you'll fail so that you don't have to _fear_ you _might_ fail. Hope is too painful to bear, so you're trying to rationalize your retreat.'

The mist is so thick, Rory feels her head is about to explode, blood rushing in her head, she starts seeing red, her eyes squeezing wildly.

'I'm not gonna watch you do this to yourself,' he says after a pause, sadly but determinedly, and it's a cold shower that pours over her, his words screaming _'leaving'_ in her head; and there it is, mist condenses and drops start drowning her.

He presses his palms against his knees and stands up.

"Let him help you so that he knows that you love him," she quotes quietly in a ragged voice and her tongue stings with the salt of her own fears.

He pauses and suddenly his throat is tightening and he's lost for words, so he just stands numbly, waiting for her to make her decision. She does.

She's so tired of rejecting him, of trying to hurt herself using him as a pretext, of repeating 'He deserves better, I want him to get someone better' when in fact she only wants him for herself. She has no strength in her, it only is enough to ask one question, and once the question is shot in the air, all strength will be gone.

'Will you help me, Jess?' she looks up but doesn't see him. She's drowning.

And then she's pulled out of that terrible salty despair and she's coughing and taking a breath while he's holding her up and she's holding on to him.

* * *

Quotes used: _'Terrible love', Birdy; "East of Eden" ( 1952, written by J. Steinbeck, ); "East of Eden" (1955, directed by Elia Kazan,) ;**  
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**A/N: Review?:)**


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